the strong do as they wish, and the weak suffer as they must

Archive for January, 2006

It is easy for a politician to say, “I am going to cut taxes,” but it is rare for a politician to tell us who is going to pay for tax cuts. As many people are aware, $1.8 trillion in tax cuts were passed by Congress in 2001 and 2003, primarily to benefit the very rich.

A lesser known fact is these tax cuts have been slowly phased in to make it easy for politicians to avoid answering the tough questions about who is going to pay for them. So far, about 80 percent of the tax cuts have been realized, and the full effect of tax cuts will be felt in 2010.

We got a glimpse of who is paying when Congress voted to cut $40 billion from vital health care and education programs in the wee hours of Dec. 19. Instead of citing the recent tax cuts as the reason for these devastating program cuts, or admitting they did not have time to read the 774-page bill before they cast their vote, the Republican majority told us sacrifices need to be made for the victims of Hurricane Katrina. This is a puzzling rationale when you consider that a day later, the Senate approved $27 billion in tax cuts for the richest people in the country.

There is no Iranian “defiance.” When news media report “defiance,” they purvey disinformation. The “seals” on Iranian nuclear facilities were placed there voluntarily by the Iranians while they attempted to resolve the false charges brought by the Bush administration.

The “Iran crisis” is entirely the product of the Bush administration’s determination to deprive Iran of its rights as a signatory of the non-proliferation treaty. It is one more demonstration of President Bush’s belief that his policies are not constrained by fact, law and international treaties.

As this article makes clear, on the face of it, it’s madness to attack Iran. So, discounting that perhaps King George and crew are in fact, stupid as a box of hair (they may well be, but not this stupid) there must be a reason behind all this. I have an idea. Since we don’t have the troops to put “boots on the ground” in Iran, the powers that be will stage manage this situation like this:

US forces begin a series of air strikes, designed to take out Iranian nuclear power plants and “secret enrichment facilities”

Which will force the Iranians to strike back at our troops in Iraq, making a horrible situation there even worse

And in our Gulf of Tonkin moment, a missile will strike Israel, who will respond with nukes, making Teheran into a parking lot. It will be widely known that the reaction was done with the full support of the US government.

King George has already proven ignorant of, and untouched (largely) by world opinion, so the notion of nuking a country probably doesn’t faze him at all. And if the bombing escalates the situation there to a breaking point?

Mighty fine by some. See, either way the world loses, and these maniacs win.

Because we only have one political party in the country- the money party- it was a virtual certainty that Samuel Alito would be confirmed to the US Supreme Court. Without an opposition party, Kerry and Kennedy’s feeble attempt at a filibuster died quicker than the new Heather Graham show- and anyone who expects Kerry, Kennedy et al to act in the public interest is mad as a hatter, btw-but what have we as a nation lost in this shifting of the court to the right? The answer ain’t womens rights, which aren’t going to go anywhere (too valuable as a recruiting tool for the GOP). No, its worse than that.

Do we accept Madison’s vision of a nation in search of peace and with personal privacy intact, or do we embrace Sam Alito’s vision of questionable elections, concentration camps, spying on citizens to create an atmosphere of fear and uncertainty, repression of women’s and minority rights, and war without end?

01/29/06 “ICH” — — Two recent polls, a Los Angeles Times/Bloomberg poll and a New York Times/CBS News poll, indicate why Bush is getting away with impeachable offenses. Half of the US population is incapable of acquiring, processing and understanding information.

01/29/06 “Mail On Sunday” — — A White House leak revealing astonishing details of how Tony Blair and George Bush lied about the Iraq war is set to cause a worldwide political storm.

A new book exposes how the two men connived to dupe the United Nations and blows the lid off Mr Blair’s claim that he was a restraining influence on Mr Bush.

He offered his total support for the war at a secret White House summit as Mr Bush displayed his contempt for the UN, made a series of wild threats against Saddam Hussein and showed a devastating ignorance about the catastrophic aftermath of the war.

Based on access to information at the highest level, the book by leading British human rights lawyer Philippe Sands QC, Professor of Law at London University, demonstrates how the two men decided to go to war regardless of whether they obtained UN backing.

The revelations make a nonsense of Mr Blair’s claim that the final decision was not made until MPs voted in the Commons 24 hours before the war – and could revive the risk of him being charged with war crimes or impeached by Parliament itself.

I always wondered why they even made the pretense of going to the UN at all. You have to wonder if these smug bastards ever think that they will face judgement?

My, isn’t the human mind interesting. It can create great works of art, invent amazing technological advances, and all sorts of other wonderful things. Or, it can get altogether weird.

The SWOC* and I were having an outing, breakfast at our favorite diner, when we noticed people coming in with teddy bears and such. We asked our waitress about it, and she said it was a group of “baby fetish” people. They called themselves the Atlanta Internet Munch Group.

Upon arriving home, we looked ’em up, and found this. They had this to say about their outing:

Wow! What an incredible munch! I really want to thank everyone who came out to the Atlanta Littles Munch today. We had more show than expected and actually had to add tables. All total 17 people made it out to this one….In addition to future munches, it seems there is the potential for a play party in the works.

Ok, you got your thing, I got my thing, everybody got a thing. But damn, this is some seriously goofy shit. Go read about ’em. Adults who wear diapers, play with toys and enjoy getting their butts powdered.

This brings to mind one of my favorite memories of my dad, who didn’t really have much time for the rest of humanity. He and I were somewhere and he was ranting about whatever idiot he had encountered earlier in the day, and someone goes “But Gus, it takes all kinds…” to which my father replied:

No, it actually doesn’t.

Get ’em Dad. You wanna act like a baby and play with toys in public? Rock on. But take your “I just peed myself”, diaper wearing, goofy ass “quirk” somewhere else. Stay out of my diner!

Seems the stink of Abramoff keeps building, getting closer to King George each moment. Now it seems the White House is attempting to quash anyone from seeing pictures of the chimp with the big bad lobbyist. Josh Marshall of Talking Points Memo has been dogged in following this.

Read about it here. Interesting stuff, if these clowns in power actually think these images aren’t gonna be released. Fools. Lying, incompetent fools.

Now that an election in Palestine has installed Hamas, a terrorist group that has the destruction of Israel as its primary objective? Bush, confusing “elections” for democracy, continues to blather on that “we’ve freed 50 million people”, (supposedly in Iraq and Afganistan, I guess), but when the results don’t go his way?

The United States and European nations declared Thursday that Hamas could not form a legitimate government unless it drops its demand to destroy Israel and renounces violence.

See, that’s not the way the game is played. In a democracy, if the people have the chance to vote in free and legitimate elections, they are free to elect whoever the hell they want to. And just because you don’t like them, doesn’t mean they aren’t “legitimate”. Hell, the majority of the world (and increasing numbers of Americans) don’t consider Bush a legitimate president, but since they don’t have our military might, they don’t count.

So we’ve seen repressive, terroristic, theocratic governments elected in Egypt, Iraq and now Palestine since 9/11. Democracy on the march?

Yeah, marching the hell away from us, thats for damn sure. Way to go George.